- Tuesday, 10 November 2009
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It is a tale told by an idiot; full of sound and fury, signifying nothing
Intel makes Core i3 and i5 official
THE WORST KEPT SECRET in the industry shocked absolutely no one when it was stealthily announced on Intel's consumer branding site by Intel VP and Corporate Marketing Director, Deborah Conrad.
The names "Core i3" and "Core i5" will now be met with nods of acknowledgement by hordes of Intelloids around the world instead of the quizzical empty gaze of I-know-nothingness with which such terms were greeted since the launch of Core i7.
Intel has posted a video of Conrad explaining how over the last few years the company has, on occasion, confused consumers with too many chip offerings and how slimming down Chipzilla's product portfolio would help consumers with their buying decisions.
According to the chipmaker's master plan, Intel will begin swatting away its Core 2 Duo and Quad models for good over the next few months.
It will be replacing the mainstream processors with the Core i3 and Core i5 brands but keeping, however, the venerable Pentium and Celeron brands alive, too. The business oriented vPro Core i5 and vPro Core i7 monikers will also see the light of day during the course of 2010 as well.
There's nothing really new in all this. By re-inventing the wheel and using a branding numerology similar to what it had in the post-Pentium 4 era, with the Pentium D 3xx, 5xx and 7xx, Intel will leave itself some marketecting headroom for the all too predictable i4, i6 and i8 processor families.
Intel had already introduced a 5-star chip model rating system this Spring, intended to give us an idea of how fully-featured a particular processor model is, so in a not so simple way, it has added yet another dimension to the confusion. Yet we're sure you'll still be able tell your Core i5 from your Core 2 Quad. µ
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Is going to be a Phenom II or whatever AMD releases next. Intel's had the upper hand for too long and their back to stupid crap like this. Tiering is GREAT for business and shitty for consumers.
If you can't figure out a tier system then maybe you lack the intellectual capacity to be using a computer in the first place. It must be so hard to grasp i3, i5, and i7 compared to E7xxx, E8xxx, QX6xxx, Q8xxx, or Q9xxx. I'm guessing that Phenom II X2, X3, or X4 isn't tier based though.
That's SIX product lines, including Atom, just for CPUs!
C'mon, Intel, you say that you have too damn many CPU products now, then you go and make it triply worse.
Rye: Phenom II x2, x3, and x4 aren't tier-based, that's the number of guaranteed cores per chip, x2 = dual, x3 = triple, x4 = quad, get it?
So how many cores do i7, i5, i3, E7xxx, E8xxx, QX6xxx, Q8xxx, and Q9xxx have? Heck, how many CPU processor models in each line?
How the hell can Intel keep track of 'em all? Must still have some Alpha-based systems in place, too complex a problem for Itaniums.
"Rye: Phenom II x2, x3, and x4 aren't tier-based, that's the number of guaranteed cores per chip, x2 = dual, x3 = triple, x4 = quad, get it?"
Yes I do get it. It is a tier based naming convention based upon number of cores. Additionally, each line also has multiple processors much like Intel. Not to mention there are other such as Athlon.
The basic premise as I see it is that most folks do not want to spend $$$ for an i7 when an i5 or i3 will work fine. I see the new naming convention being i7 is the top of the line, i5 is mainstream, and i3 is budget.
Clearly no matter how you look at it, both naming conventions can be misunderstood for the majority of people. I would agree that Intel does seem to be resting on their laurels since they have regained the performance crown. However, while Intel is notorious for doing such things, they do occasionally offer some good - high k dielectrics coming to market - which benefit AMD. Hopefuly now that AMD has unloaded their fab overhead, they can focus more money on R&D to push the envelope.
The real problem isn't with the naming of the CPUs, it's that not all of the new Intel CPUs will run on the same socket which will make it quite confusing when trying to match up the processors with motherboards and RAM for consumers.
i7s are on one socket with triple channel memory while, i5s and i3s are on a different socket with dual channel memory. So that leaves you with a huge number of boards to chose from as well as dual channel or triple channel RAM kits.
At least with the recent AMD socket update to AM3, the AM3 CPUs will still work fine on most AM2 or AM2+ boards with DDR2 and dual channel DDR3 is still the standard for all of their new CPU models for at least the next year or so. It is also the same socket for the high end quad core Phenom IIs or the low end dual core AM3 processors.
Im sorry but I would rather have it take 6 minutes then 3 minutes for some thing to get done. I need that time just to do everything else.
Sorry, but AMD isnt a nightmare to buy for, i decided to sace some cash on a media centre and go AMD, since its only going HD decoding hopefully it can handle it, but there are SOOOO many SKUS its crazy
firstly you have to know what all the AM2 AM2+ and AM3 means? im still not sure to be honest, then you have Athlon 64, athlon 64 X2, athlon 64 II X2, then all this Phenom X2 X3 X4 II, blar blar, the real world differences between some of from different generations of design, are so small it makes you wonder why they even botherd making it.
Intel is simply
E - Dual core
Q - Quad core
(higher the number next to it the better)
now the new CPU thats using a totally different sockets so no confusion at all on it
i3
i5
i7
again, high the number next to it the better
i cant comment on the i series since its not released but the E and Q series is pretty straight forward.
What took me 10 min to do for an intel system, took a whole day on AMD, including having to look at there model spec sheets on AMDS site. which for some twist of lunicy doesnt have all there models on!! WHY??
Where did Shab say he "couldnt figure out" a tier system? He didnt. *You* said that. Classic straw man argument. Im betting youre an intel fanboi?
Not that it really matters. The simple fact is that however AMD care to brand their CPUs, they all fit in the same socket. This used to be true of intel CPUs under S775, but AIUI will *not* for i3/5/7.
So: if an upgrade path is important to you, buy AMD. If you want top performance off the bat, buy i7. i3 and i5 can be safely ignored by everyone.
HTH.
AMD's systems are easy. Stop adding in the deprecated platforms.
AM2 - DDR2 Memory. Socket. Old.
AM3 - DDR3 Memory. New (higher is better).
Athlon II X2 - Dual Core
Phenom II X2 X3 X4 - Dual/Tri/Quad Core (see, look at the number!).
Essentially, in terms of branding:
Phenom II == Core i5
Athlon II == Core i3
except they both run in the same sockets, both run in the older socket for upgraders. They all support the same technologies like virtualisation.
why the fuss over branding? its near impossible to simplify something that is essentially complicated by so many models. you want choice, but you dont want a list of models? sorry but it cannot work both ways. the fuss is stupid.
i dont hear people moaning about buying a new car and cant tell if they want a ford focus coupe cabriolet, or a focus c max or an ST, or an RS, with ghia or titanium trim levels and the 1.6 zetec SE Ti VCT, or the plain old 1.6 TDCI DPF? you just get the hell on with it and do the research into which one you want with what spec and why. why would buying a processor be any different or more difficult for a consumer?
personally i have no preference as to platforms because i have an equal mix of Intel/AMD stuff both at home and at work.
i'll say that with the Intel on 775 it was relatively simple, but what's with the completely different sockets on the i7 vs i3/i5? I wish they would have simply standardized on the i7 LGA1366 and made it so that one of the memory channels wouldn't be usable with an i3/i5 installed.
with AMD it is pretty simple. i'll admit they screwed up with the s754/939 (i never got an S754!) but once they moved to AM2 everything was simplified. you can simply plug an AM2 OR AM3 processor into an AM2 or AM2+ board. AM3 processors will go into AM2, AM2+ or AM3 boards so you have not only an upgrade path but also flexibility with memory if you have an AM3 proc.
One other HUGE thing is that all Athlon/Phenom procs support virtualization which i use on several platforms with Hyper-V. with the virtualization becoming part on Win 7 i'm sure it'll become a bigger issue.
i have Athlon BE's that i bought for $50 (with the board) that i'm running hyper-v on. Intel is not consistent in their virtualization support.
that being said, i'll get whatever fits my needs/budget when i upgrade next, but these obviously matter to me.
Seriously.. you guys will argue about anything.
I heartily recomend a sex life to any here bellow who believes that the most important thing about a CPU is what it's called.
In all fairness I'd prefer if AMD could just stick to one naming convention... ie the way they (or at least ATI division) name their graphics.
Generation - Permormance Tier - Performance Sub Tier : ala 4870
to rationalise this ill break the code down for the gpus as follows:
4th Pro Performance = 4870
3rd Pro Budget = 3850
so, finally getting to my point for the chips:
Phenom II = 2nd for generation.
The next number/name for the cores.
Then the number/name for the clock speed.
2nd Pro Budget = Phenom II X4 805
2nd Pro Standard = Phenom II X4 810
2nd Pro Performance = Phenom II X4 910
so why then cant we call the Phenom II X4 910 the 2870 or start with the same generation number as the graphics... that way they could tell you what to ideally pair what with what... then again this doesnt take into account the X2 cards... jesus this is more complicated than i thought it would be... im just gonna stop.
What a joke, Who the hell downgrades to something shitty just because the company they're with kicks @$$? WHO!?! and dude if you are going to switch you should probably get your head out of your @$$ and find out what model you're going to get before you spend money on something that's worse than what you wanted to get. I personally like this idea of the I series it sounds good to me an we all know that they won't be as pricey as the I7. I myself am certainly getting the I5